


No Sweet Talk

by sharklion



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V
Genre: M/M, passive-aggressive mind games, ygoshipolympics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-26
Updated: 2015-06-26
Packaged: 2018-04-06 05:57:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,731
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4210608
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sharklion/pseuds/sharklion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was an obvious challenge, and Shun had to eat eventually-- the chocolates looked expensive, besides.  He grabbed one without saying a word and bit down, keeping eye contact with Reiji.<br/>---<br/>Downtime in Standard is longer than expected, and Reiji and Shun are not experts in communication.  Written for ygoshipolympics, prompt: chocolate + challenge prompt: not valentines.</p>
            </blockquote>





	No Sweet Talk

"The verdict?" 

"Dislocation of two ribs. We should be able to set them without much difficulty." The doctor handed over the clipboard to Reiji when he held his hands out for it, who read it over with no difficulty, heedless of the messy handwritten kanji.

"I see." He lowered the clipboard and turned towards the occupied bed. "Kurosaki, before she begins, do you have any allergies the hospital needs to be aware of?"

"No. I don't need anaesthesia." Shun wasn't willing to put himself unconscious in LDS's hands. Sleeping was one thing; he was a light sleeper, but being _knocked_ out and unable to wake on his own was a risk further than he was willing to take. Even if Reiji claimed to have the same goal, sparing no trust had served him well so far— he wasn't going to break a good habit because of a small uncertain reprieve.

"It can be performed without. No food allergies either? You will still need to eat." Akaba said it placidly, in the same tone he inquired into Shun's allergies. Shun glared up at him, irritated. He didn't need to be reminded that Akaba ultimately controlled everything in this building, including the food he ate, and that if Akaba wanted him drugged he didn't have to _ask_ permission.

"None." Akaba nodded, jotted it down, and handed the clipboard back to the doctor. He didn't leave the room, and Shun exhaled loudly. "If you're going to stay, make yourself useful. Get me something to bite down on."

Reiji stood there still for a moment, looking down at Shun over the rims of his glasses before turning to leave the room. A few moments later, Shun turned to the doctor.

"Set them now," he ordered her. "It's his own fault for taking too long."

Not wanting to be in-between their power-jockeying, and having other patients to attend to, she did as she was asked. Just as well, because Akaba wouldn't come back for another half hour, a small box in hand, with a small mass-produced card that read 'Get Well Soon' in characters large enough to be read across the room.

"No allergies, correct?" Akaba inquired, like he thought Shun's answer might have changed, and opened up the top. Inside were two chocolate truffles. "You are here to recover. I don't want you poisoned by mistake."

It was an obvious challenge, and Shun had to eat eventually— the chocolates looked expensive, besides. He grabbed one without saying a word and bit down, keeping eye contact with Reiji.

Dark chocolate and bitter almond.

\--

Recovery still took longer than Shun liked, which is to say, any time at all. He wanted to be out of bed, out of the hospital, doing _something_ rather than sitting around when he felt perfectly fine. The extra days they wanted to keep him for observation due to malnutrition were nothing more an annoyance.

That Reiji had decided to work from his hospital room only increased his annoyance. If he wasn't here, it would be easy to escape.

"Don't you have somewhere else to be?" he groused.

"I can access feeds from the observation room remotely, and now that the tournament is over there is a less pressing need to be available on premises at all times." Akaba didn’t look up from his screen as he replied.

"Is there a reason you have to do this _here?_ " Shun didn't motion to the hospital room, but his voice was pointed enough to get the point across, even if Akaba wouldn't deign to look at him. "Shouldn't you dedicate some time to that brother of yours?" 

"Layra is being supervised, even without my presence." He was dismissive, like when Shun had first tried to take him hostage to use as leverage against Akaba Leo— it made his blood boil, his casual disregard for family. "Meanwhile, if you are left to your own devices you will try and slip away."

"There's no reason for me to sit around here!"

"If you push yourself too hard it increases the probability your body will fail you when you need it."

"It won't happen." His voice wasn't stubborn— he was just stating a fact. Sheer force of steeled will carried him to and past his limits. He'd been in worse states before, and being expected to wait out the rest of his healing period in a hospital bed while a CEO _babysat_ him was insulting.

Reiji looked up from his laptop, evaluating his condition. Shun wanted to spit at him not to apply _Standard's_ pathetic standards to him, but Reiji wasn't remotely coddling. He looked him over then back to his screen. It was the most grating thing yet— that Akaba _clearly_ agreed with his assessment, but was ignoring his argument anyway.

"If you want entertainment, isn't that what _your_ Standard duelists focus on?" Shun scoffed— Reiji had just forfeited any claims to _legitimate_ reasons to be in his room, so now it was a matter of what rooting out what exactly he wanted with him. He hadn’t pretended to be decent company in years. Fusion bled any part that could have been called friendly out of him, and bred bitterness to his veins instead. He was stronger for it, but hell if he had patience for other people anymore— hell if he knew how to deal with others at all when it wasn't for business and battle. 

"LDS is changing the curriculum. Our courses offered will have a practical focus on combat situations, and students will receive training in high-stress situations to simulate battlefield conditions. The real solid system scenario you and Shiun'in Sora tested is likely to be reused to prepare them." 

Shun's sharp gaze bore into Reiji— Standard's duelists were far under par, but the thought of them reliving the terror of Heartland's bombings, dueling through it as _training,_ was like chewing gravel. But Akaba leaving his school's education substandard as it was, with Fusion's invasion encroaching, was an equally odious thought, and he looked away. He didn't know _what_ he wanted to hear, so he made an unhappy noise and looked away. "You think throwing children at them will be enough?"

"Adults are welcome to take advantage of LDS's courses too, of course." Reiji looked over the top of his glasses, placid, but for Reiji to actually tear his gaze from his laptop and meet Shun's eyes. . . It was as close as he came to challenging, without ever acknowledging any question of his total control that could _make_ it a challenge. "But, if you would like to help us improve our measures while you're here, and unable to take your usual spot in the observation room. . . I have footage of fusion's actions and actions that are suspected to be connected to their movements. As you have experience with their tactics, we could benefit from your eyes."

That Reiji _was_ there for business was a relief at that point. Shun grabbed for the laptop, which Reiji pushed into his lap with no argument. Reiji pulled his chair up closer to the bedside and leaned in to move the cursor to a new folder, heedless of the fact that he was leaning over Shun, and when he pulled away he was still close. It was the way he used to watch movies with Ute, so he forced away the strong wave of nostalgia away by focusing on the file names. Some of it was footage from the tournament, but there were unfamiliar titles in there too. "All of this?"

"There's more." Akaba confirmed. "Are you alert enough to get through these? I have combed through them myself for the obvious already, so you will need to pay attention."

Shun bristled at the implication that he wouldn't pay attention— Standard wasn't _his_ world, but he wasn't going to allow Fusion to make any more headway. He shoved Reiji away, off the bed, where he fell with a thud. Shun had expected him to dodge, and the sound that came when he hit the floor instead was pure satisfaction. He was smirking, and suddenly in a _much_ better mood. "Then don't distract me."

It took Akaba a moment to recover, stunned, on the floor, before he stood and moved to the doorway. "I'll expect to hear your report and suggestions when I return. Do well, and you'll be rewarded." 

Shun didn't dignify that with a response— he wasn't some _dog_ that could be bribed with treats, but getting angry with Reiji would only give him back the upper-hand. He turned to the screen, as Akaba was doing before, and began to go over the footage. Akaba left, then.

Only to return a few hours later, two small boxes in hand. He walked over to the bed, and looked over Shun's shoulder. "That's the extent of your progress?"

"Yes." Why was he even asking? It was obvious. He pulled up the document he'd been typing his notes in— Standard's technology was behind Heartland's, or at least, Heartland's _before_ , and it had taken him some time to fumble out the machine's operation. But to Reiji, he ought to be able to read what was on the screen easily, and was asking just to make a nuisance of himself. 

"I see." Without explaining, he set down one of the boxes by Shun's bedside. A box that was the same size and shape as the one from the day his ribs were set, and before he opened it Shun knew what was in there. 

"I don't need your bribes."

"You don't." Akaba agreed, and sat down to watch Shun— his typing, or watching his watching the footage, or to see how long Shun would take before he took the chocolate wasn't clear. But it _was_ clear that he wasn't going to let Shun to himself as it was.

He didn't pause the video but reached over to take one— long and flat today, rather than a truffle. His teeth bit down and through the dark chocolate before they hit the tough brown sugar core. Molasses. 

Reiji was calling him slow and it was only with a great force of will that he continued chewing and swallowed. Keeping his eyes on the screen, he tapped the footage forward— he absolutely didn't glance at Akaba. He wouldn't give him the satisfaction of knowing his petty insult hit home. He'd improve.

\---

After his stay in the hospital, the observation room was only _more_ grating, not less. 

From the hospital, he _knew_ that there was no need for their continued use of it. But still, day after day, Reiji came. He'd sit as still as a shop mannequin, selling the picture of perfect concentration to the subordinates who operated the room. It was all about image, Reiji had explained one night. In a city covered in cameras, making certain to present the image he wanted displayed to the public and the spies that had infiltrated amongst them was a must.

Shun had scathingly told him, " _Inspiring_. The public of Standard finds it comforting to have an emptily staring _doll_ as their leader?"

"A robot," Akaba corrected seriously, and Shun's lip had curled in disgust. "A machine that will not tire in weakness, forever watching." 

"You're acting as a _puppet_ to your plans." The cool detachment repulsed some part of him deeply. He fought for a home he had once loved, a sister he loved, and a friend now gone— what was it that Reiji fought for?

Reiji only floated one hand up to eye level, and splayed his fingers, a pantomime of holding a marionette's wooden cross. "It is my hands on the strings, Kurosaki."

Shun felt a chill up his spine and turned away to look back at the softly glowing screens. The people on the other side of the screen didn't look at him with eyes like the drowning abyss. They didn't look at him at all, having no idea he was watching behind the camera . Reiji's gaze detached from him and Shun could feel his attention leaving his back as he turned back to his own observations, but a few minutes later Reiji passed him a chocolate—

A white chocolate piece, shaped like a chessboard knight. Shun stared at it a moment, picking it up and then letting it down, still held in his hand but nowhere near his mouth.

"You don't like white chocolate?" Reiji asked. The chocolate started to soften with the heat of his palms and stuck to Shun's hand.

"No," he agreed, and took a bite, grimacing. 

\---

Now that he didn’t _have_ to sit still, he didn’t. The observation room that was Akaba's second home was only sometimes Shun's. There were days he spent elsewhere, training, all the LDS facilities open to his use. 

But there were days he didn’t— even out there he felt restless, trapped. With no working technology to leave Standard, they were left waiting for the invasion. In the LDS tower's look-out post, he could at least put his time to good use. The last and only known survivor of Heartland, he knew the behavioral tics of Academia's training the best, with eyes that scavenged Fusion's spies out like a hunting hawk.

 

(His eyes had become more valuable than Layra's, he'd heard one Akaba say to the other. Reiji, not bothering to keep his voice down when he spoke to Himika.

That he talks about his brother like that, putting weight in the value of his eyes; that his mother says Reiji-san, and their conversations are like business transactions; Shun's stomach revolts against this family. The acid nausea might have been pity or envy, but in the end it was all the same-- they had each other while he had no one. No one at all, just his duty to pace the floor like a housebound predator and pick off the rats that infested the walls under Reiji's watchful eyes.

It was Standard business as usual.

For a while.)

"That one." Shun pointed to a screen, and they paused and rewound. "The girl's stance when stopped in the hall. She goes for her duel disk before stopping herself. She's expecting a confrontation."

Reiji looked up over his folded hands, the glare of the screen on his glasses hiding his eyes. "No. She is the daughter of one of the former top team members. It is highly unlikely she's a Fusion spy, as her activities have been well documented going back several years. It's advisable that you get more rest, then return in the morning."

It was the third false positive this evening. "I am _not_ making mistakes! Those are Academia behaviors!"

"Each of them has been a member of the LDS student body."

"I'm still not wrong! Those Academia behaviors _are_ coming from _somewh_ —" He stopped mid-word, and then said slowly, danger in every syllable: "Here. They're learning them _here_. You're using the _same_ methods."

"Which methods?"

"Don't play dumb! The same as the _Academia_. You'd know the specifics best, to teach with them!" 

"Their educational curriculum is proven to work. The problem is not with their teaching methods, but rather the ends they apply their duelists to. We are building up a defense force. They are using their Duelists to destroy other worlds."

He could only let out a bark of laughter. Of course, Reiji would think that. "Like _father_ , like _son_." The words were offhand, a simple insult and truth, but somehow it offended Reiji. Like blood was something to deny, like he'd rather bleed bile than the same human red.

"Kurosaki." Stiff words. "That tic— you have the same habit."

No, he doesn't. Shun stepped back, a sharp denial on his tongue, but before he could voice it Reiji swapped the monitor that was showing the girl to another set of footage: someone taps him on the shoulder from behind to get him to move to access a door behind him, and in one smooth movement Shun wheels around, duel disk at the ready. It was a moment in time Shun would have never remembered. He had no idea what to think of the fact that Akaba had that moment of his life so memorized that he had it on to use as evidence against him at a moment's notice.

But it's undeniable, he does. 

"It's the mark of a well-trained fighter. Your resistance members. . . were the rest of them here, I am certain you would find that they all have the same trait. This is what you once found lacking in LDS. That steeled will you found so lacking in the students— they have finally met your expectations. They are acquiring it. They are aware of the weight of their lives, and how simple it would be for a single moment's carelessness to end it. If you would like proof, it wouldn't be a hardship to set up a match."

"Fine." He agreed because he wanted to leave the room; the dizzy feeling it gave him was like his feet were held firm on crumbling ground.

The girl met him in the black, blank expanse of a solid vision room, and the stands were packed. They were here to see him. The students here had come to idolize him— there was a clamor and more spectators than Shun could even bear to count, dizzying with all eyes on him at all times. They were not here to entertain anymore— each of them seemed printed in his own image. They'd seen the footage of his victory over fusion soldiers, over Shuin'in, and listened to the words he said, that once passed unheeded. Now he was the survivor of a cautionary tale, and his words were almost prophecy to them.

So he said as little as possible when he had an audience, silent until the girl told him to select a field. He spoke directly to his duel disk, through the communication channel to Reiji who was no doubt operating the controls. "Not Heartland."

Instead, it was a highway. The girl's fists clenched and he remembered what Reiji had said: a daughter of the top team. _Former_ top team, until Shun had carded them and sent Reiji their paper remains. 

It explained a lot.

But a duel was never the place for hesitation, only a place to strike down those that hesitated. There was nothing casual in either of their movements, and despite the audience, the lack of consequence. He felt it in her dueling— the will LDS had lacked. His traps and summoning were matched by counter-traps— it was a deck made to negate magic and special summoning. It would disrupt Fusion, even if there were turns where she struggled to put monsters on the field, and each of those turns she sprinted for the action magic— a good habit here, but one she would need to be broken of. 

He won, which was never in question. She kept her head bowed low as her life-points dropped to zero, then lifted it to stubbornly meet his eyes, hers dry but only because she had found a bitten lip and a stiff jaw drowned out shame. She bowed. "I'll do better next time." Regret soaked each word in promise.

He had no doubt she would keep it. The background was bereft of any applause, absolutely no star-struck response like the public had given him when he'd given exposition duels since the battle royale. The quality of silence was different from when he had won over Shiun'in, without the blank disbelief of horror they'd had back then, when the audience had turned to each other to talk, to reject it. His gaze shifted to the audience now, and most of the students were still focused on him, like a lecturer to memorize before a vital test. (Or maybe it had been too many years since he'd been in school— weren't there a lot of lectures that went ignored? It was more a soldier's silence before an officer.)

Shun took a pair of cards from his pocket— ones Reiji had been trying to make Nakajima foist off on him. Pendulum cards that worked as searchers, special summoning a monster equal in level to the number of cards destroyed on the field. He tossed them her way, and told her without looking, "Here. Take them."

Her face didn't brighten, but she stood alert, her eyes glowing the coal ember growing of a battle fire. Her brittle will would be smelted into the foundation of something unwavering, something that wouldn’t break.

He returned to his room discomfitted. Reiji's army was nothing like what he saw of Standard before— it was no longer a joke to imagine them standing up to fusion. Nothing about it was funny at all.

There was another box on the desk. There was no crisp penmanship or pre-printed note to accompany it, but there was no question who it came from.

The truffle inside was _shockingly_ sweet, cloying and far too much. If he weren't loath to waste food he would have spat it out, but instead he chewed it. Past the milk chocolate shell, he bit down into the broken joint texture of nuts, the marrow texture of marshmallow, all of it artificial sweetness.

It took him a moment to place the name of the flavor, before it came to him: Rocky Road.

\---

On his pillow there was a new box of chocolate when he woke. That, at least, explained why his dreams smelled like lavender and chocolate, even as he dreamt again of Heartland burning.

It was the last straw. He threw on his clothes from where he had left them wrinkled on the floor the previous night, grabbed the charge card LDS had granted him, and left.

He arrived later than usual at the observation room, which didn't go unnoticed. He threw the door open to see Akaba alone in the room. Reiji swiveled his chair around and greeted him, "Kurosaki," but didn't manage to get more out than his name before Shun, shouting, cut him off.

" _Stop communicating with coded chocolates!_ " He flung one from the mixed box he'd purchased at Reiji's head and was satisfied when it hit home— apparently it never occurred to him to duck or dodge, because Shun had not at all been hiding his intentions when he stormed in, box in hand. "Use **words** like a _human being_ if you have something to say!" Two more bounced off his head and onto the control panel.

"Was this morning's too obtuse?" It was hard to radiate an aura of composure after having been struck with three chocolates, but Reiji did his best, readjusting his glasses. "Lavender has various meanings, but most commonly distrust and devot—" Another chocolate bounced off the rim and he didn't finish his sentence as they were knocked askew again, then off entirely. Without the red rims in the way, there was no way to hide his disgruntlement as he glared at Shun and grabbed for them to right them back onto his face.

It was the most human reaction he'd gotten from Akaba, _ever_. "I don't care what it means! Don't use _chocolate_ for _passive-aggressive mindgames!_ " He moved closer and slammed the box down before grabbing for one of Akaba's hands and moving it down over the opened lid. " _Take one_ ," he ordered.

Akaba looked at him like he'd lost his mind.

"Take one!" He didn't loosen his grip but shifted it to Akaba's wrist, where his grasp would be harder to escape. Reiji gave him a hard look, and without looking down at the box took one between in his fingers. "What does it _mean_?" Shun pressed.

"I thought you were through with coded chocolates?" Reiji's tone wavered between dryly amused and bewildered, then hissed as Shun's grip on his wrist tightened painfully, his nails digging in and breaking skin. He looked down. "Taste would help with deciphering it."

Eyes narrowed, Shun took the chocolate from between Akaba's fingers with his free hand and placed it between Reiji's parted lips. Akaba tilted his head back to take it fully in his mouth, then bit down. "Lemonade." Akaba spoke like he was passing judgement on it, and had found it wanting. "Making the best of a poor situation."

"Wrong." Shun removed his fingers from Reiji's lips.

"Then something _souring_ a formerly sweet situa—"

Shun cut him off, "No. I had no idea which one you'd choose. That is _not_ what this is."

"Explain your point, Kurosaki." Reiji's gaze was definitely a glare, and Shun released his wrist and took one chocolate from the box.

"Chocolates are gifts. Don't you know that? Don't you know anything?!" He held the chocolate between them at eye level. "You don't take value in anything— not _this_ , not your _family_ — not this world that you're claiming to defend!"

"It's my duty to Standard."

 

"Your _duty_ ," Shun scoffed. "Do you even _care_? Are you saving it for Layra, to have a home to come back to?! You don't even have a home now, all your hours spent stowed away in here!"

"We will be strong enough to face Fusion." If there had been any vehemence in Reiji's voice, the confidence might have been enough to carry it through, but Shun heard only the empty well of Reiji's promise.

Shun's voice carried the ring of determination that Reiji's lacked. "You'll face them and fall. You aren't fighting for anything." 

"The people of Standard know what they stand to lose." Reiji pushed Shun's hand away and spun in his chair, back to the monitors, meaning to end the conversation.

"Your soldiers aren't the problem. _You_ are." He wasn't done with this, and didn't let him alone, following closer to Reiji's side. Akaba's eyes were fixed solidly on the center monitor, completely still in their gaze. 

"What is it you expect me to do, Kurosaki?" Apparently even Akaba found it hard to focus with someone looking at him so closely, intently focused on him with so little space between them.

"Fix it." His personality being what it was, he was the _last_ person to talk, but even _Shun_ understood the value of a home, family, comrades, even if he imagined he could hear the echo of Ruri's laughter in his ears, telling him giving this kind of talk didn't suit him. "Spend time with someone and have it _mean_ something. You're not going to make Fusion invade any sooner, and the way you are you're just _wasting_ your own time."

"It's time to prepare. Are you suggesting I waste more of it?"

"The time I spent with Ruri wasn't _wasted_ ," Shun bared his teeth, daring Akaba to continue further down that line. "Spend time with someone that matters! Prepare with them— not the way you _instruct_ your brother, but like he's a goddamn human being!"

"My brother would know what to do with that company even less than I would know how to spend it." It was difficult to tell if it was an admission of weakness, with Reiji's lack of intonation.

"Then find someone else."

"Nakajima is my bodyguard, and is paid to perform his role. Himika has other concerns than the humanity of her son." The short list was definitely an admission, this time, as was the slight bitterness in his voice. Reiji-san, Shun remembered, was how Himika addressed him, with the distance of formality despite blood ties.

"Fine. If I'm the only person in this damn building that realizes you're a person, then fine." Shun sat down on his lap, holding the box.

"Kurosaki— what is this—!"

"Shut up. We're spending time together." Shun's own mind rebuked him for frivolity, but the way things were was _wrong_. Any day that Shun was more emotionally competent than another person marked a _deep_ deficit. And if this was the wrong way to go about it, it wasn't like Akaba would have any better idea than he would. He took a pair of heart shaped chocolates out of the box and deposited it on the control panel while Reiji watched him, looking as if he had just declared his eternal allegiance to the Fusion Empire. "It's a gift. If you don't want it, fine. But it's my offer."

He met Reiji's eyes and put his own piece into his mouth— and was somehow surprised when Reiji did the same.

The chocolate tasted like raspberry and meant nothing more at all.


End file.
